5 comments about When Cats Reigned Like Kings: On the Trail of the Sacred Cats.

1. Considering the august reputation of the author and the number of pages, I expected a much more scholarly discussion on this subject. I was disappointed to wade through so many personal stories of her cats performing typical cat antics. While cute to a degree, less would have been an improvement so that the real topic could shine through. The title promises much more than is delivered. Too many cutsie remarks and exclamation points detract.
   
   Some fascinating information is included, and that did keep me reading, but one has to excavate for the good stuff. The interviews and descriptions of the places traveled are interesting and worth the time. Exploring some additional cultures would also have been appropriate.
   
   However, I commend Geyer for adding to the anecdotal nonfiction shelves about felines.
   
   Whle the book is not a total waste of time, be prepared for a lot of fluff if you're looking for the real story.



2. I very much enjoyed reading this book since I am very much a cat person. I have a special interest in cats since I work at an egyptian museum and have done quite a bit of research on cats especially the Egyptian cat goddess, Bastet. I love the way Georgie Geyer humanized the cat and the research she put into the book. Not to mention the wonderful humor and the warmth in which she portrayed the cats. I loved seeing the cats in a different perspective and traveling with the author to unusual places that I probably will never see.



3. This book is superb and the service from Amazon could not be equalled.



4. I do not know if it was because I am a cat lover, but I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in history. Ms. Geyer is an interesting author and has written a real page-turner. I thank her for making information which could have been dull bright and interesting. I now know more about the origins of my own beloved cats.



5. Back in November, I read an excerpt of this book in Geyer's column and thought: I've got to get this!!
   This book is well-written, and hooked me right from the beginning. Geyer's interest in the human-cat relationship takes her and you the reader to Egypt, Burma, Japan, and Thailand, plus her descriptions of the main cat breeds is helpful and informative. There are two sections of pictures, one section showing her own two cats the late great Pasha and her current cat, Nikko, as well as photos from her various travels. The second set shows the breeds of cats discussed in part two and all have a high 'aawwww' factor. Plus there is an appendix chronicling the evolution of the human-cat relationship throughout the world. All in all a great read!

No comments about Problem-Based Feline Medicine.

1 comments about Cat Psalms: Prayers My Cats Have Taught Me (Cat Collection).

1. I love this book. A neighbor loaned me his copy and I loved it so much that I purchased several copies to send to my grown children and one for myself. This is a wonderful gift for any age for Christians.

4 comments about Good Cat!: A Proven Guide to Successful Litter Box Use and Problem Solving.

1. Very common sense, basic training info. My 15 year old cat is urinating all over the house, however, we have been taking him to a weekend home for 15 years and to date has never had an elimination misshap. My long time veterinarian is equally perplexed as to his different behavior in 2 different places. All the available urine analysis & blood tests were done.
   I've tried multiple unscented litters at home and different litter boxes to no avail. There has been no change in the location of his litter box or our behavior,that is noticeable to us!
   I was hoping that this book would have offered us some solution that we hadn't already tried. If you don't have extensive experience with cats, I'd recommend it to the lay cat owner!



2. I didn't find anything in this book that I couldn't find on the web, but the advantage of owning it is that it is all in one place and can be used for a quick reference.
   
   I have two adolescent cats that urinated repeatedly on a bed and in the corner of the dining room. In November I dropped them off at the Animal Protective League on a Friday afternoon and told the truth as to why I was leaving them. On Saturday I read the receipt they gave me and saw separate charges for each cat for 1) Euthanasia; and 2) Cremation. By Sunday evening I was sick and quite depressed. All I could see was one of them (named Jewel) looking right at me meowing with a scared look in her face as they were taking her away.
   
   On Monday I called and was able to get them back on Wednesday sans gonads. Using this book and other information from their vet and the web I devised a five week program of re-education for my friends consisting of:
   
   1) Changing litter brands; 2) Moving the litter boxes to a more convenient location; 3) Confining them to the basement with their food and litter when I wasn't at home; 4) Thoroughly treating the spots where they (both of them!) were urinating; 5) Playing with and feeding them both at these same spots; 6) Gradually allowing them more time to freely roam the house.
   
   I graduated them both the first week in January by giving them complete ownership of the house and here it is mid February and there have been NO violations. They sleep on the bed and pretty much ignore the area in the dining room where they used to urinate.
   
   I really could not have lived with myself had I not at least tried to work with them before opting for the the last resort - euthanasia. I now have two friends that share their house with me and provide me with good companionship and a lot of laughs.



3. This book is easy to read and full of useful advice that I haven't found anywhere else! The book tells you how to solve your cat's behavioral problems by getting to the root of the problem. I love my cat and I love this book!



4. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It was very helpful. There was a lot of good, practical advice. Book gave me insight to my cat's behavior - he's pretty good at this stage - but I understand him even better now!! Thanks, Shirlee!

5 comments about Scarlett Saves Her Family.

1. When I first learned of this true life account of a very brave little mother cat, I was moved to tears. There is no creature on the planet, human or animal, who does not fear fire. Scarlet put her life at great risk, again and again, to save her five kittens. How great is a mother's love?

   Scarlet may be just a cat to some, but to me she personifies everything a mother should be! If you care about animals, you can't help but love Scarlet. You will be deeply touched by the many caring humans who became intertwined in her little life. From the truly compassionate firefighter, David Gianelli, to the woman who eventually adopted Scarlet, you'll pleasantly savor and revel in the goodness of mankind.

   This book should be recommended reading in our public schools because it lovingly teaches children compassion and virtues. Though the photos of a severely burned Scarlet are graphic,they poignantly illustrate the depth of her devotion and willingness to suffer pain in order to save the lives of her babies.

   I loved this book. I love knowing that Scarlet is forever loved and cherished and has left a indelible memory in the hearts of caring people everywhere.




2. If this book doesn't lift your spirits and make you feel like there are still compassionate people in this world then nothing will. It is a "can't miss" book for cat lovers -- or for anybody who has a heart. It's the tale of the power of a mother cat's love in saving her family of newborn kittens, and of the people who worked so hard to help them recover. It is an inspiring story to share.



3. When I found out the book was out I just had to get it! Reading about her and seeing the pictures of how she was so hurt made me realize was a blessed cat she was. She went through hell to save her family. If this book does not make you both cry and feel great joy, then I wonder about you. Read this book, have your children read this book, you will love it!



4. Scarlett was once a nameless, unknown, unloved alley cat -- until a fire, set to the abandoned building that was "home" to her and her five month-old kittens, drove Scarlett to the act of bravery that has touched human hearts worldwide. Five times, Scarlett nosed through the smoke and flames to rescue her babies. Back and forth, carrying her infants to the slushy, winter-drenched street. Scarlett herself suffered massive burns; her eyes were swollen shut and much of her fur was singed away.

   She was found in this state by fireman David Giannelli, who tenderly, urgently rescued Scarlett and her brood. From there, a human flood of care, compassion, love, and hope helped the feline family to heal from the trauma...and all (excepting one kitten, who died from a later viral infection) are now happy homebodies who I'm sure have entirely taken over the lives and hearts of their humans!

   This story illustrates the very best of human and animal compassion. What better, irrefutable evidence for the intelligence, love, and courage of other species! Take it home and prepare to cry your heart out -- I did!




5. Hey, who says New Yorkers have no heart? Scarlett
   was our heroine for days!! I could understand cat
   nuts like myself but Everyone was caught up in this feline desplay of valor, devotion and what it
   means to be a mother. I loved it.

5 comments about Cats (Smithsonian Handbooks).

1. A good book for a general overview of cat breeds. Great pictures.
   
   I'd have liked a bit more infromation on each breed though, the info given is only very basic.



2. This is a really good book. My daughter 10 years old loves it. She kept checking it out of the library. I found it on line and purchased it. She keeps it in a safe place. A must for all cat lovers.



3. I read the book "cats" by: David Alderton and this book tells everything from kittens being born to the ancestry of these felines. This book has facts about every cat just about and their body weight and lots more. This book has everything on them, whether it's just for your pleasure or for the facts this books got it. I loved this book I thought it was very good, it has a lot of very good information and facts, it also has over 700 colorful pictures.
   This book tells you anything and everything about cats. It's a great book for children to learn about both domestic and exotic cats and kittens. This book helps you with your decision on buying or adopting a cat and picking out which one's right for you. It talks about how to groom them this book even tells you which breeds of cats always win shows and awards and how to win one with your feline. It tells you how many months it takes before a kitten is fully weaned off its mother's milk and doesn't need its mother anymore.
   "BUY THIS BOOK "this is a very good and interesting and factual book. This book is great for children or cat lovers of any age. It is very unique and could tell you just about anything you need and want to know about cats and kittens.



4. I've owned this book (the eyewitness edition, actually) for years, and it's still the best and most comprehensive photographic guide to cat breeds that I've seen. Great, clear photographs featuring both common and some rarer breeds in all the major color variations for each breed, as well as lots of good, interesting info on each breed and its history.
   
   A must have for cat lovers!



5. Ideal for people who like cats, or for people who hate cats but want to know their enemy.

5 comments about The New Yorker Book of Cat Cartoons.

1. I thought I was getting a paperback version of the original hardback book of cartoons. It is the same book but the paperback version is much smaller than the hardback.



2. If you live with a cat, you'll want to read it before you give it to another feline lover; it makes a wonderful present.



3. The New Yorker has all these things, and the combination of cats and The New Yorker is a felicitious one. These witty, wonderful cartoons are just the thing to bring a sparkle to even the most glazed of eyes.

   Two ladies sipping tea, a cat strolling past tail in the air. "Whe she was little," one says "we had a very close relationship, but now we're just friends."

   And a hundred others. A book is not as good as a cat, but this one is halfway there.




4. Cats you say? Take a look at the cover. Take a good look. Nobody does it like THE NEW YORKER. 101 cartons and 65 years later, the cats still have the last laugh. High level stuff and highly recommended!



5. I rated this book based on the hardcover version, but I do want to put in a word against the miniature paperback version in the beginning. Avoid the miniature paperback: It is very tiny, reproduced poorly, the paper quality is not good, and some of the material cannot be seen without a magnifying glass.

   The only drawback I saw to the hardcover version was the lack of a witty introduction. I graded it down one star for that lack. The New Yorker cartoon books on business and money have wonderful introductions, unlike this one.

   In the spirit of full disclosure, I must admit that I do not have a cat. Yet I have many friends who do, and I tried to view these cartoons through their eyes.

   The main cartoonists of these 102 cartoons are Charles Addams, Tom Cheney, Helen Hokinson, Frank Modell, Mischa Richter, Danny Shanahan, William Steig, and Saul Steinberg.

   The cartoons generally follow one of the following styles: juxtaposing cats for dogs; anthropomorphizing cats; and treating humans like cats. These formats were predictable enough that the humor worked best when one of the categories was not followed, such as in a cartoon with no words where a cat is seen scratching against an arm chair while a man sits in it reading the newspaper -- chair, man, and newspaper all bear the same scratch marks everywhere.

   Here are a few of my favorites:

   A woman letting a large number of cats out of the back door: "Everyone be home by two o'clock."

   No words: A man sits in a chair reading with his feet on a bear skin run. Behind him, a cat lies in a bed with a mouseskin rug on the floor in front.

   A man receiving a call at work: "Your wife feels that your cat needs to hear an authoritative male voice."

   One mouse to another: "Miss Egan, bring me everything we have on cats."

   Dog to cat: "Hey, pal, let's hear 'Doggie in the Window' again, and this time play it like you mean it!"

   Cat to cat in bow tie: "I'm sorry, but I think it's uncatlike."

   Cat in casts to another cat in casts in vet's office: "I tried to make it from the windowsill to the top of the refrigerator. How about you?"

   Cat behind loan officer desk in bank to dog: "Beg."

   Man to cat: "The fact that you cats were considered sacred in ancient Egypt cuts no ice with me."

   Person shouting through the window to a woman in a roomful of cats: "Glendora Hogan got another load of cats, Elinor honey. Can you take a couple?"

   Let this good-natured look at one of our favorite animal friends liven up your day, and remind you of the humor behind everything. It's only our stalled thinking that denies us a good laugh at everything!

5 comments about ASPCA Complete Guide to Cats: Everything You Need to Know About Choosing and Caring for Your Pet (Aspc Complete Guide to).

1. I just adopted my furry son Riley, and this book has been very helpful. I'm a novice cat owner and, although I'm familiar with cats, I was a bit nervous about deciphering behavior and making his transition easy on both of us. The Complete Guide to Cats is very practical and down to earth - every suggestion comes with several ways of implementing it. I found the guide to behavior and the section on feeding and litterbox selection to be particularly helpful. The section on breeds, while interesting, was a little overwhelming - my guy is an orange tabby of no particular breed and I got a little hung up on the various grooming requirements before I figured him out.



2. A well written and well informed book that would be a wonderful addition to the bookshelf of anyone who has a cat or is considering adding a cat to their household. Highly Recommended!



3. Whenever I have a question about my cat, I whip out this book and find my answer in seconds. It presents the information in in an easy-to-find, simple format. I would recommend this to any cat owner. I bought one for my mom when she got a cat.



4. This was a really good book. The author did a good job at explaining the behaviors of cats. He also points out which breeds are good in which homes. The color pictures are just beautiful... and some are extremely funny. I highly recommend this book to anyone that has even a smidgen of interest in cats. There are so many breeds that I did not know even existed! He also shows pictures and descriptions of mixed breed cats and even points out the benefits of spaying and neutering! So full of information. It had me in awe and I thought I already knew alot. I HIGHLY recommend this book!



5. As anyone who knows me knows, I have cats. I seem to attract them, well, like cats! I have cat joys and cat tragedies especially prominent in the past few years, with two outdoor disappearances and one indoor death, yet with wonderful new additions and the experience of sharing my home with seven new kittens born under my desk one summer, and five more from a different stray the next summer.

   I had always considered cats low maintenance, essentially self-sufficient. This was a requirement to me, as I'm not home very often, and when I am, I can't spend too much time on cat duty. This was the reason I opted for cats over dogs. I was raised a dog person. But dogs require attention several times a day. Sorry, can't do it...

   Well, with all that happened in the past year, I found that cats, while generally low-maintenance, have periods nonetheless in which they need special care and attention (even if, like Emma, they don't really want it). Thus, being a person in the education mode, I decided I needed to learn more. It just so happened that one of my book clubs was offering the ASPCA Complete Guide to Cats, so I ordered it.

   This has been a gem of a book. It is complete, concise yet filled with information, well organised, colourful and picture-ful, durable (slick coating on the covers and a finish on the pages means the cats can walk across with dampened paws and not destroy the book, useful when it is opened when I attending their needs).

   The first section discusses how and when to bring a cat home. It addresses such issues as cats and kids, preparing the home for a cat, your own readiness, and which kind is most appropriate for which environment. It also discusses what to do when welcoming your new friend into the home. Food, vet care, litter (to box or not to box, ah, that is a question!), and how to introduce new cats to other cats is discussed.

   The second section is a reference guide to cat breeds. In addition to specific breeds organised alphabetically (Abyssinian to York Chocolate) it talks about coat palettes and patterns, colourations, paw and toe issues, and special needs. The breed section identifies special grooming and dietary needs, lap- and kid-friendly breeds, energy, and of course, wonderful photographs of representative cats for each breed.

   Section three gives a bit of biological and physiological information, about cats, as well as (if it is possible!) some insight into the psychological functioning of cats. Are they really that smart? Are they really that clean? It addresses mating habits and catnip addictions, too!

   The fourth section has been the most important to me, Taking care of your cat. It discusses briefly everyday feeding and care, but then has a good section on potential health concerns, what to do in the case of injury and illness, gives home nursing tips (important with Emma), and how to deal with both the beginning and end of the lifespan, which, with new kittens in the bedroom and a declining Emma in the living room, I was dealing with both ends of the spectrum.

   This is an excellent one-volume reference to cats, useful for anyone who cares for cats. The appendices have glossaries, telephone numbers and resources, and recommended readings to continue a feline-related education.

   But, if you just pick this one up for the pictures, it would be worth it for that too. And you might just learn something along the way--always a plus.

5 comments about The Big Cats and Their Fossil Relatives.

1. This is BY FAR the best book about ANY prehistoric mammals that I have ever found! The fact that the subject is cats makes the book unique. There just isn't another book like this one. The focus is on fossil cats and their modern descendants, but they are discussed in relation to the environment and the other animals around them. The text is thorough, informative and very lucid. The writing style is clear and concise, without being terse and dry. A college student or interested adult will find it technical enough not to insult their intelligence, yet it is so well plotted and presented that an enthusiastic pre-teen can follow it (although they may need some help with some of the more technical terms). Turner obviously knows and loves cats.
   
   Now, to the illustrations. Mauricio Anton has absolutely no equal as an illustrator of cats. His illustrations of the other animals who share the cats' habitats are equally enthralling. His renderings are so lifelike that they place the reader right beside the cat. You can almost smell the dirt as it's raised by the hooves of the struggling prey and hear the sounds of interaction between cats and the creatures around them. The book is worth having for the color plates alone, but the pencil drawings are fabulous too, and in some ways even more informative than the plates.
   
   As a lifelong student and admirer of cats of all sizes, I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I reread it at least six or eight times a year, and refer to it almost daily. This book belongs in the collection of everyone who is interested in animals and wildlife art.



2. It's hard to review this book without tossing in a bucketful of giddy superlatives, so I'll stick with WONDERFUL! It contains some of the most strikingly beautiful artwork contained in any scholarly book. Having said that, a potential reader needs to keep in mind that this isn't a "popular science" book. You'll be encountering terms like "Paleocene" and "carnassials", but even though they might be a little confusing, they won't hurt you, either.
   
   Get this book! There may never be another work like this about the ancestral cats in print again.



3. I liked most everything about this book. This is a great natural history of the big cats and their various ancient ancestors going back some 25 million years. I especially enenjoyed chapters 4-Anatomy And Action, and 5-Behavior And Ecology. Also, Mr. Anton is a fine artist. This book should appeal to anyone with even a modest interest in the big cats. Both the color plates and the black and white drawings are lifelike and worth the price of the book.



4. For the lay reader - such as me - the welter of taxonomical and anatomical details with which this book is filled could perhaps have made it very boring. However, the fine drawing and the speculative detail about reconstrued ecology and behavior made the book a light read, even comic at times, when you discover that sabertoothed cats were a kind of lions and tigers "on steroids", with heavily muscled forelimbs and shoulders allowing them to immobilize the prey to the ground in order to deliver a devastating neck bite that would close a windpipe and sever bloodvessels neatly and quickly. Very funny to think that evolution could have taken this alternative path of turning the gracile feline form into something like a BB contest...



5. This is a great book on the evolution of the big cats, in fact I think its probably the only book outside of research journals or more technical material. Its wonderfully illustrated with very detailed pencil drawings of skulls, skeletons, musculature, and 'life reconstructions' of exctinct big cats. Also includes color plates with scenes depicting the cats and their habitats. The text is well organized and accesible to the informed layperson and is detailed enough to satisfy those with a deeper understanding of the subject matter.
   
   The illustrations really makes the book stand out: they are detailed and well drawn, and really bring the subject matter to life, as if you were able to examine the museum collection yourself, and then go on a prehistoric safari. An excellent choice for those interested in cat biology, natural history, or paleontology.

No comments about Cat-titudes to Live By.